


That Damn Pterodactyl

by Creed Cascade (creedcascade)



Category: Torchwood
Genre: Dinosaurs, Humor, Ianto's Duties, M/M, Pets, Pterodactyl, eidetic memory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-11
Updated: 2011-11-11
Packaged: 2017-10-25 22:56:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/275770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/creedcascade/pseuds/Creed%20Cascade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes you need to bitch about work to your lover, and even if he's you're boss, he should shut up and agree with everything you say for a second. Even if it’s about a damn pterodactyl.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That Damn Pterodactyl

**Author's Note:**

> No pterodactyls were harmed or touched inappropriately in the writing of this story. Introducing one version of 51st century sex.

Ianto Jones was cursed, or blessed depending on how you looked at it, with an eidetic memory. He remembered almost every detail from his past experiences. The layperson often thought because it was commonly called “photographic memory”, that eidetic memory was simply like a mental movie that could be played, fast-forward, and rewound on demand. Ianto relived his past experiences with painstaking nuances. Remembering meant he felt the emotions of each experience all over again with a jumble of senses. There was no turning that off. Ianto had to admit it came in handy for paperwork, but it was a bitch when you were an insomniac and couldn’t help reliving the horror of Canary Wharf.

The night he lost Lisa wasn’t in the Hub of Torchwood 3, but rather the day the Cybermen attacked Canary Wharf. He never wanted to forget the night the thing using Lisa’s body tried to end the world with Ianto’s willing help. Ianto knew reliving that night was his penance for his selfish betrayal. His desperate need and fear of loneliness had driven him to believe that under the glove of alien armour, Lisa was still hidden. Ianto thought that there was nothing that could make those memories dim, but he had under estimated the power of Captain Jack Harness. The man who Ianto was willing to kill for and more painfully, dared to live and love again. The all consuming man who was Ianto’s boss, lover, saviour, and tormentor. Some days Ianto doubted he would survive Jack being everything to him.

There were many things in Torchwood that made Ianto think of Jack. But, there were two things that were a near-constant reminder of the Captain. The first was the pocket watch. Ianto will slip his hand into his pocket and just run his fingertips over the metal to be reminded of Jack. The other is Myfanawy. A living, breathing, and flying being that makes Ianto think of their first job together on the good days, and the night the Cyberwoman became pterodactyl chum on the bad days.

Each time Ianto remembered what he just refers to as “That Night” it was horrifyingly different. On one particular night as he listened to Myfanawy fussing in the rafters of the Hub, his memories were sparked. Ianto could smell the distinctive tangy odour of the pterodactyl’s barbeque sauce that Jack doused the Cyberwoman with. He could hear the flap of wings as Myfanawy dived and the ripping of flesh from metal. Ianto’s stomach rolled as he heard the clacking of the pterodactyl’s beak against technological innards. He remembered the feeling of watching Jack drag the Cyberwoman’s cold, heavy body to the disposal area deep in the Hub’s bowels and seeing the jagged deep wounds left by the creature. He remembered that Lisa’s flesh had bled, bright and red like this at Canary Wharf. That Night Myfanawy’s hungry and anxious cries had rung through Hub. That Night Ianto’s relationship with the pterodactyl had become almost as complicated as the one Ianto had with Jack.

That Night Jack sent the others home when the world had been saved and literally cleaned up Ianto’s mess. Ianto had been too numb to do anything except sit on the floor of the Hub and watch Jack. With the Cyberwoman and her paraphernalia disassembled, Ianto had managed to stumble to his feet, mumbling about feeding that damn pterodactyl. Despite being numb from bone deep grief, Ianto kept mumbling that he had to feed Myfanawy. Jack let him do it after releasing keeping some semblance of routine was Ianto’s strange connection to normalcy in a tempest of insanity. Myfanawy’s taste of metal tinged human flesh had only been an appetizer. Ianto had dry-heaved as he defrosted and cut up her buckets of cod heads. That Night Myfanawy had sensed Ianto’s unease and squawked in distress. She refused to eat the cod heads and flew off to hide in the upper echelons of the Hub. Watching her soar over head and openly falling apart, Ianto had realized he was tied to the dinosaur through joy, need, and death. She reminded him of his relationship with Jack even more so That Night.

After Jack left, Ianto would stay up at night with Myfanawy. He would close his eyes, listening to her and relive the day he lured Jack into hiring him. He could feel Jack’s body warm against him and the scratch of Jack’s great coat against his skin. With the Team gone, he could let his mask slip a little. He functioned without Jack and kept working, but he could hardly call it living. Those months without Jack, Ianto lived for his memories. In the darkness of the night, he slipped back to relive the feel of Jack fingertips teasing him. He loved to recall the wicked things Jack could do with his mouth, seducing Ianto with his words and tongue. It almost felt real as he remembered how Jack would slowly undress him, savouring undoing his tie with a teasing grin. The sweet stretch and burn of Jack’s fingers and length inside seemed nearly real. Experiences and sensations melted together. Pleasure committed to memory evoked reactions that left Ianto achingly hard.

When Myfanawy’s mournful screeches would startle Ianto out of his remembrances, Ianto was both pissed off and thankful. Ianto wasn’t the only one looking for Jack. A part of Ianto might have hated Myfanawy for attacking what he had thought was Lisa, but a larger part of him was grateful that the creature helped him remember Jack.

++++++

Ianto’s fingers flew over the keyboard as he typed out an incident report. Multitasking wasn’t an apt description for what he was capable of doing. His employee file never listed his true intelligence because the IQ tests couldn’t register intelligence that high. The Torchwood One psychologists never could have guessed that Junior Researcher Ianto Jones was so dangerously intelligent that he could adapt and conceal alien technology to the extent he did. The mundane tasks of administration and clean up were easy for him to filter as he contemplated other problems. Jack had once said that Ianto was an able, but not exceptional student. That was simply because Ianto had coasted through school with engaging only a small fraction of his true aptitude. It had taken Jack’s pull and the Rift to finally exploit Ianto’s full potential.

Ianto was drawn out of his contemplation of traversable wormholes when a titanium ring the size of human skull dropped beside his desk. It rolled around on a circle and was quickly followed by a demanding squawk from Myfanawy. She was perched on the railing with her head cocked to the side.

Ianto sighed and looked up. Myfanawy simply snapped her beak with an excited screech. That’s when Ianto saw the offending smear on Myfanawy’s beak. Ianto gave her a quick hand signal and she hopped on the railing closer to Ianto, flapping her wings excitedly. It was one of the signals she loved the most, meaning she had been ordered to come closer to Ianto. Ianto stood up and stalked over to Myfanawy. His finger scooped up the white substance from her beak and one sniff confirmed that it was an artificial white icing.

Ianto tapped his ear piece onto a private channel. “Jack, someone has been feeding Myfanawy Twinkies again.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because I both import and inventory your junk food supply to humour your fixation with nostalgic Americana. Oh, and maybe the Twinkie goo on her beak?” Ianto huffed. “What kind of person feeds a pterodactyl Twinkies?”

“I don’t know, but I suspect you’re going to tell me.”

Myfanawy squawked again and shuffled back and forth impatiently on her perch. Ianto reached out to scratch on her neck. “The kind of person who has no concept of the kind of care this type of creature deserves, that’s who.”

“Are you telling me this as your boss, or as your…”

“Well, certainly not as my boss,” Ianto snapped. “Because, it’s not like you’re going to do anything about it.”

“Maybe she just likes Twinkies.” Ianto heard the double echo of Jack’s voice. Jack was standing behind him and his ear piece was still active.

Ianto was still dressed in his full suit, but Jack had somewhere left his coat behind. The sleeves of his white shirts were rolled up and Ianto’s gaze was drawn to Jack’s suspenders.

Ianto was still scratching Myfanawy’s neck and she was tilting her head to the side. Ianto dropped the connection, but kept his back turned on the other man. He concentrated on Myfanawy who was preening under the attention. Despite her size, Owen estimated her age from bone density scans to still be a juvenile. Owen claimed that the reason Myfanawy was so attached to Ianto was because she had imprinted on him. Ianto thought Owen was an arse but admitted there might be some credence to the hypothesis.

Ianto dug into his pocket and grabbed a small treat for Myfanawy. With his palm grasped over it, he slipped it to her. “Anthropomorphism is the sign of a weak mind.”

Jack circled around Ianto watching him carefully. “I know about your little secret.”

“Honestly, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Ianto answered with a deadpan expression. Myfanawy happily nuzzled at Ianto’s hand to see if there were any of the small treats left.

The corner of Jack’s mouth quirked into a smirk. “I like to think of it as your own twenty-first century pheromones.”

“Jack…” It was just the beginning of Ianto’s warning tone.

“Not sir?”

“You’re not my boss right now,” Ianto reminded him. Myfanawy reached out with her beak and gently nuzzled on the outside of Ianto’s suit. He was the only human that she let get this close to her. Even with Jack’s charm, she preferred Ianto to Jack. Ianto gently tapped her beak and reached inside his pocket to pull out the few remaining coffee beans. “Are you really accusing me of keeping chocolate covered coffee beans on me as an aphrodisiac?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Jack moved a little closer and laid his hand on Ianto’s shoulder. “I was thinking something a little more ominous. I was suspecting more of a subtle form of sexual conditioning directed at me. I smell coffee and I think of you. I think of you, I think of sex. Therefore, if I smell coffee, I think of sex.”

Ianto snorted and shook his head. “You think of anything and you think of sex, Jack.”

Jack squeezed Ianto’s shoulder. Through two layers of fabric, his fingers delicately started to trace Ianto’s collar bone. He never really got used to this century’s limited concept of erogenous zones. He smiled when Ianto’s breathe hitched minutely. “I think I should be insulted. Are you complaining about me being oversexed now? Because I thought you were still complaining about me feeding Twinkies to Myfanawy.”

Ianto glared over his shoulder at Jack, but didn’t brush away Jack’s hand. “Yes, my boss is in trouble for feeding Myfanawy inappropriately. He should know better. You’re not in trouble for anything at the moment, though if I give you a fraction of a second, I know you will give me ample opportunity. Your job right now is just to let me vent about my boss.”

“I listen.” Jack moved in closer and wrapped his arm around Ianto’s waist. “Your boss is a horrible, horrible man. Always sexually harassing you.”

Ianto managed to keep from smiling and gave Jack a mock scowl. “Don’t forget the Twinkies.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to enlighten me on the inappropriateness of Twinkies. I’ve seen what she eats and Twinkies are by far not the worst thing she’s digested or hacked up. Remember that furball the size of a llama Owen found on his desk?” Jack patted Ianto’s stomach and then moved around him, crouching down to pick up the large ring. “And then there’s this. I know you’ve been tying rats to it and hiding them around the Hub. The question is… why?” Myfanawy saw the ring and was flapping her wings excitedly. Jack tossed the ring into the air and she took off, catching it easily. With several powerful flaps and with the ring in her beak, Myfanawy was soon perched in front of them. ”She already knows fetch.”

“It’s part of an enrichment program.”

“Uh huh.”

“I wrote a report,” Ianto said. It didn’t miss his attention how Jack gave him a bit of a blank look and Ianto sighed. “It’s on your desk. It’s part of the enrichment program we’ve instituted for detainees.”

Jack slowly sauntered back to stand behind Ianto. “I know. I pay more attention to you than you give me credit for, both as a boss and lover. Sometimes the two roles don’t mix and trust me, I get that, but…”

Ianto groaned with frustration. “Jack, sometimes you just…”

Jack stepped in close until his front was pressed tight to Ianto’s back. “Sometimes, I just need to shut up and agree with everything you say for a second?”

Ianto nodded. “It wouldn’t hurt.”

“I read the report,” Jack admitted. “Every word. I might have been the one who instituted the protocol to stop unnecessarily killing Weevils, but you’re the one who’s made their captivity somewhat tolerable. I know you trap live rats for them and even give them buckets of ice with SPAM frozen into it. I even know that you’ve reformulated Myfanawy’s BBQ sauce.”

Jack didn’t need to say why Ianto had reformulated Myfanawy’s feeding sauce. After the night Jack directed Myfanawy to attack the Cyberwoman, the smell of that sauce always made Ianto nauseous.

“She’s not a pet…” Ianto’s tone was slightly defensive, but also unsure.

“No more than you’re just the tea boy. Tell her to amuse herself elsewhere.” Jack’s right hand moved until it he settled it over Ianto’s collar bone. “Unless you’re not done complaining about your boss to your lover? I would ask you if you would like to complain to your boss about your lover, but that’s unprofessional and you…” Jack tapped Ianto’s collar bone “…are a professional.”

“A professional what?”

Jack didn’t answer and flashed a toothy grin at Ianto. His fingertips were slowly tracing over Ianto’s collarbone, shifting down to press underneath slowly. Jack felt Ianto’s suit shift under his palms as Ianto gave Myfanawy a sharp hand signal. She squawked and took flight, circling higher into the lofty confines of the Hub.

Jack kept his right hand on Ianto’s collar bone and his left hand moved to the base of Ianto’s neck. He leaned in and whispered into Ianto’s ear. “I have something new to show you.”

“A new game? You’ll cheat.”

“No,” Jack answered. He dug his thumb carefully into the curve of Ianto’s spine, tracing it up to the base of Ianto’s skull. “Skeletal sex.”

Ianto tensed when he heard that. “What?”

“Not a very sexy name, I’ll admit, but it’s…” Jack dug his thumb in just right pressing against Ianto’s spine and earned a moan from Ianto. “Fun. I can make you come just by manipulating your skeletal frame. Externally, of course. Humans don’t do the inside out thing very well until some develop an exoskeleton, but that’s a story for another time.”

After everything he had done with Jack, Ianto had no doubt what the man said was true. He reached out and grabbed the railing as Jack’s fingers were working down his spine. “Wouldn’t it work better without the suit?”

“I like the suit,” Jack insisted. “Even if it’s not the cute suit. Just invoice me for the dry cleaning bill.”

“I always do, sir.”

Several minutes and a rumpled, stained suit later, when Ianto’s cries rang in the Hub, Myfanawy called back with high pitched screeches. Ianto could have sworn afterwards when he was reliving the memories that she had been laughing.

END.


End file.
